Aston Martin owner Lawrence Stroll has told employees that Christian Horner will not be joining the Formula 1 team.
Stroll gave a speech to staff at the Aston Martin factory on Tuesday in which he said taking on Horner was “not happening”, sources have told BBC Sport.
Stroll said in his speech that the new leadership structure announced by the team this week would remain in place.
F1 design legend Adrian Newey is to become team principal from the start of 2026, in addition to his role as managing technical partner.
Current team principal and chief executive officer Andy Cowell is to move into a new role in which he is responsible for setting up the relationship with new engine partner Honda and the team’s fuel suppliers.
Horner, who was sacked by Red Bull in July after 20 years leading the team, had been pushing for a role at Aston Martin as one of his options for returning to F1.
An Aston Martin spokesperson denied Horner had been given a tour of the factory under cover of darkness by Newey earlier this week.
Stroll did not deny there had been conversations with Horner in his speech.
But there are questions as to whether Horner would be acceptable to Newey, who left Red Bull last April at least in part because of a decline in their relationship.
Newey was upset about the allegations of sexual harassment and coercive, controlling behaviour made against Horner by a female employee. Horner was twice cleared of the claims by internal Red Bull investigations.
And Newey was unsettled by politics within the design department, in which he believed colleagues were claiming credit for work he felt was his and that Horner was encouraging that.
Horner wants to return to F1 but only in a position that gives him a shareholding and total authority over a team.
Cowell was moved aside after it became apparent he and Newey had different leadership styles and opinions as to how the team would be run.
Newey is regarded as arguably the greatest F1 designer in history, having won 14 drivers’ titles and 12 constructors’ championships with Williams, McLaren and Red Bull.
Newey said in an interview with Sky Sports on Friday at the Qatar Grand Prix: “To be perfectly honest, it became very evident that, with the challenge of the ’26 PU and Andy’s skillset in terms of helping the three-way relationship between Honda, Aramco and ourselves, it is absolutely his skillset.
“So he very magnanimously volunteered to be heavily involved in that through the first part of ’26.
“That left a kind of, ‘OK, who’s going to be TP?’ And since I’m going to be doing all the early races anyway, it doesn’t actually particularly change my workload because I’m there anyway so I may as well pick up that bit.”
